To Love Oneself
by Cavallo Alato
Summary: Struggling with oneself, or not struggling at all. To know what it is to love oneself...that is pride, right?


****Just a little writing to loosen up...it also helps relieve stress.

I'm terribly sorry for any OOC-ness. I'm not that skilled at keeping in character, but here you go, anyways. *throws writing*

Disclaimer: KHR does NOT belong to me. (if it did, it would be full of Marysue's destroying the world and then parallel-world-hopping)

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><p>I love myself.<p>

I love them.

She loved herself.

She hated them.

Always, she stood alone.

There was never anyone to her left, never anyone to her right. She saw the things that no one else saw. The little bubbles that crawled across the glass, squirming and disappearing with a little flare of multi-colored light. The faces that appeared in the window when she put on her ring. The girl had the vision. They were all there.

But they weren't.

Earth.

Specialty.

Comfort.

_I love myself._

All were things that somehow had relationships in her mind. And then they would suddenly become ideas like:

Adel.

Julie's hat.

Dogs chasing boys.

_I love myself._

To her, people were everywhere, yet nowhere. Love was not earned, but inevitable. But to what subject the love was directed…that was a different story.

Voice was a preference. Actions were seen only by oneself. One's body was one's like or dislike. One's clothing was the foundation of the emptiness. It was because she was the way she was, dressed the way she dressed, talked the way she talked.

Why no one stood on her left, and never anyone to her right.

She stood alone.

School bell.

Baseball.

Eye patch girl.

_I love myself._

She said. Every day. She loved herself. It was because she loved herself that she could see the miniscule bubbles of flickering light dance across the glass, and that faces would press themselves against the panes, straining with fruitless efforts to enter the room. But never would they reach a hand out. She loved only herself. So she put on her ring, and named it her specialty.

Only the dense, thickheaded people loved others.

So she thought.

_I love myself._

_I love everything about myself._

_And that is all I will love. No more, no less._

She imagined towers made of sand, looming in the distance, only visible if she wrapped herself in a ball and hung upside down. Even then, the faint, vanishing flame in the lonely window of slowly deteriorating sand was still a blur. She would hang there for hours, eyes unblinking, legs crossed for so long they grew numb and useless, but she still couldn't see the face behind that window.

All the other windows were so easy to see through.

She saw the faces.

Cards, playing cards.

Sin and Penalty.

Law of the Avenger.

_I love myself._

Sometimes, one would smile at her through the glass. The little bubbles would float about, framing her delicate, porcelain features. The one would reach out a hand, press a hand against the pane, golden hair drifting about her shoulders. From her sleeve, the one would pull out a card, an ace of spades. Smile never faltering, she would lay it against the window, and then drop it as she disappeared with the next front of wind.

Ace.

Reason.

Key.

_I love myself._

She studied without passion. She read her standard textbooks without a single drop of emotion. Here was a girl who didn't care about others. Here was a girl who loved her family.

But that wasn't true.

Because she only loved herself.

Real people came to see her during the day, only to receive no response from her. She would continue to swing upside down and wait, or cross her legs and stare at the wall as if she could see right through it. And perhaps, she could. But the sand castle drifted. Farther and farther away, until it was a mere speck in the sky.

Sky.

Opposition.

Discomfort.

_I love myself._

**I hate them****.**

There was a thin line between "other" and "the other other". One was family. One was not. Both were not as loved as she loved herself.

So she kept hanging. Hanging and fighting for the little bubbles that never popped, but disappeared into the nothingness of sky. The endless blanket of above that stretched forever, that hid her answers from sight.

She hated it.

Pride.

Life.

Therefore.

_I love myself._

She had pride. She knew what her pride was, and it was exactly that and nothing else. Even if she was proved wrong in everything she had ever known once, twice, forty times, she would never forget her pride. Forty times later, her pride would be just that much stronger.

And that was the reason why the Avenger took her.

Playing cards.

Kindness.

Prison.

_I love myself more than anyone else._

He'd tried to save her. She was grateful for that. There was a clear line between "kindness" and "opposition". There was a clear line between "victory" and "defeat". She just could not figure out where her pride was supposed to be.

A hand was playing the cards, she knew. She had been shown.

Chains and locks put her away, but she knew.

Her pride was of herself, but the ones who could make a change were the ones whose pride would eventually merge and become the key. She had found the third key. Forty times stronger, now, she was sure her pride would stay with her.

The question remained as: Did she really hate them?

No.

She loved them, she loved her family.

But she also loved herself.

Respect.

Interest.

Once again.

So she thought, floating over the town, hanging upside down.

If I love myself, and if I love them, and if they love the "other", then what is it?

If one braved to call her "Shitopi-chan", then as Shitt. P, who was she to not reply? What did it mean to reply willingly?

What is the real definition of love, of friendship, of trust?

And hanging upside down, by herself.

The castle never appeared again.

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><p>We need more Shitopi-chan, no?<p>

Half prose/half poetry type writing. Doesn't necessarily make sense.

See my little references in there? Vindice is "avenger" in Italian...

And can you guess who it is she saw in the window?

Ciao Ciao

-CavAlato-


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